Public Interest Briefs

Bally’s, a nationwide health club chain with over 300 affiliated facilities, advertises their centers as “equal opportunity clubs.” Yet when Frank Lindsey and Richard Boekenoogen attempted to purchase memberships in their neighborhood Bally’s club, they found that the West Hollywood Sports Connection was largely inaccessible to people in wheelchairs. 

Richard Boekenoogen first approached the Sports Connection in 1993. Since then, both he and Frank Lindsey have tried to persuade Bally’s to make the West Hollywood club accessible, as required by California legislation and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Bally’s refused, suggesting instead that the two men use other Bally’s facilities which are more distant but wheelchair accessible. 

After repeated refusals by Bally’s, Boekenoogen and Lindsey asked CLIPI for legal assistance, In January CLIPI, along with the non-profit Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund (DREDF), filed suit in federal court on their behalf against the Bally’s health club chain for failure to comply with the ADA. 

The ADA, passed in 1990, requires that a public accommodation remove architectural barriers to accessibility where that removal is “readily achievable” (see ADA, page 4). Previous California legislation, passed in 1982, outlined state accessibility guidelines. Yet when the West Hollywood Sports Connection remodeled in 1987, the complaint alleges, they made no provision for wheelchair access and even now continue to ignore state and federal accessibility requirements. 

CLIPI’s suit alleges that many modifications necessary for compliance are readily achievable. For example, the building contains an elevator which, with some changes, could provide access to the second floor where Nautilus and weight-lifting equipment is located. Similarly, a ground level, wheelchair-accessible gate could provide access to the swimming pool and locker rooms, but is currently kept padlocked. Bally has begun to discuss these modifications, but has not yet instituted them. 

“The ADA expressly prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability,” stated attorney Gus May, acting for CLIPI on behalf of the plaintiffs. “Richard and Frank need access to a health club to maintain the upper body strength necessary to maneuver a wheelchair. They also need to be fully integrated members of their community and able to attend the health club that their friends and neighbors attend. Instead, what Bally’s has offered the two men is a more expensive membership which would theoretically entitle them to use all Bally’s facilities. After calling many of these facilities, we found that only some are accessible. Bally’s is not only discrimination against people with disabilities, but also falsely representing to them the benefits of a membership in a Bally’s club.”

(continued in full brief)